LG TO MATSUSHITA: HAPPY NEW YEAR! LG Electronics Inc, South Korea's second-largest consumer electronics manufacturer, filed another patent infringement suit against the South Korea unit of Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. over plasma screen technologies, LG said.

The second lawsuit against Panasonic Korea, filed with a Seoul district court, accuses the Japanese company of infringing four plasma display panel (PDP) patents related to the structure of electrodes and panel-operating technologies.

"Panasonic Korea should scrap finished and semi-finished PDPs that infringe on LG Electronics' patent rights," the Korean company said in a court statement.

The suit is the latest development in an escalating dispute between LG Electronics and Matsushita over PDP technologies.